So we took the subway to the western most edge of the system and then took a 3 hour bus ride to Cuan Di Xia. Cuan Di Xia is a small village 90 km outside of Beijing. The residents lived there nestled between mountains, far away from everyone and were self-sustaining. Most of the city was built during the late Qing and Early Ming Dynasties. So the architecture is really representative of that era. There are 76 preserved hutongs where you can spend the night.
Our bus ride was good. Here's a picture of BeiBei shielding herself from the sun. Someone on the bus even took out their umbrella! Chinese (and most Asians) people do not like being tan. So even just a bit of sun shining on them prompts covering up in any way possible.
On the way we saw evidence of angular plate tectonic folding.
I made Chase take a picture of this truck carrying coal. We heard mining noises throughout the valley. Chase thinks they are just mining for rocks for making concrete. Fernando thought they were mining for Uranium. I think that Coal's the real possibility. Here's the evidence:
As soon as we got to the village, we started orienting ourselves to find a guest house. Chase and I had imagined a picturesque village where we could buy antiques, stay in a cozy guest house, and do some hiking. Our Western influenced mindset gave us a different hopes for what it would be like. Here's BeiBei and Fernando towards the end of the village.
The guest houses were not renovated hutongs like I imagined. They were poorly kept and I really wish a bit more effort was made in saving and protecting this site. At least it gave us a true picture of what life was like in this mountain village- no heating, no running water, and freezing cold air. I was the coldest of everyone as I truly believe I should be living in the tropics because of my body type. So here I am sitting closest to the radiator with gloves, two beanies, my warmest jacket, a scarf, and about 3 layers on under my jacket. No one else is so bundled up.
The specialty of the house was a chicken and mushroom dish which came out to be a soup. In my effort to be sociable I accepted to have some of the soup and break my vegetarianism. They were out of all of the veggies dishes I was interested in- no potatoes, eggplant, or tofu. So this was one of my only choices. In case you were wondering, I am doing pretty well in maintaining my vegetarian diet and I feel bad every time I eat chicken nowadays (something that I didn't mind doing in the US... something has just changed). But more on that later. I think this picture is great because they use every part of the chicken including the head and the claws, etc. Here's a picture of the head.
Like I said earlier, our accomodations were pretty unexceptional. But don't worry, we were enjoying the idea of "roughing it." Here's Chase in our room with a built in brick bed. The bed had several layers of comforters on it and we added a few more.
The only source of heat was a small hole in the ground where the laoban, or landlord/boss, lit a small log. The heat is only intended to warm the room until you fall asleep. We were remarkably warm with the comforters they gave us even though the outside temperature was reading 1 degree celcius. I especially enjoyed using the pillows they gave us which were stuffed with wheat husks.
After we ate and drank some really strong rice liquor of the region, we headed back up to the top of the village to look at the stars. In Beijing, we can not see any stars even on clear pollution days. So this was a real treat for us city dwellers. I couldn't take my eyes of the stars. I was in such amazement at the amount of stars in the sky. I felt like a child in awe of the wonder of the Universe. And then I saw a shooting star! That was the highlight of my weekend. It shot clear across the sky and Chase was able to look up in time to see the tail end of it. Another interesting aspect of the night sky was that we were able to see the Milky Way and Chase and I realized that for the first time we were seeing the other side of the Milky Way because usually we have been on the Western Hemisphere, looking up at the sky. This side of the Milky Way is definitely long, stretching across the whole sky, but not nearly as bright as the other side and towards the end of the left side, it splits into two branches. This leads me to believe we were looking at the side the Earth is closest to. We got some rest as we were freezing cold and needed to have energy for the big hike we had planned.
1 comment:
awww... shooting star! wow. I bet it was breathtaking. :o) And man, that was really roughin it, but looks like it was fun (and culturally enlightening)! From the looks of the soup, it's not hard to tell why vegetarianism is more appealing in China. I'm quite the carnivore-- and even I wouldn't eat a lamb leg or a soup with a chicken head in it... not to mention claws! Bleh. :oP
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